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infinitely fit and right that he should look upon the infinitely glorious God, his Maker and Governor, as being what he was, and as having such a right to him, and authority over him, as he had, and that he should be affected and act accordingly, antecedent to the consideration of any covenant-transaction: And, no doubt, this was actually the case with him before that covenant was made; for he was created in the image of God, (Gen. i. 27.) And so his heart was full of a sense of his glory, and of admiring and adoring thoughts: He felt that he was not his own, but the Lord's-and he loved him, and was entirely devoted to him, in the temper of his mind, conscious of the infinite obliga tions he was under thereto. And farther, it is certain that God was the sole Lord and owner of this lower world, and all things in it; and that Adam had no right to any thing but by a divine grant: And it is certain it was fit that Adam should be put into a state of trial, and that God had authority to do it.

And now, since he was naturally under such infinite obligations to love and obey God, his Maker....God, the supreme Lord and sovereign Governor of all things-since he had no right to any of the trees of the garden, but by the free grant of God; and since it was fit he should be put into a state of trial, and God had authority to do it: since these things were so, it is evident that constitution was HOLY-In the day thou eatest thereof, thou shalt surely die. God had a right to make such a law, for Adam was his, and all the trees in the garden were his, and he was, by nature, GOD, SUPREME LORD AND SOVEREIGN GovERNOR of the whole world, and it was fitting he should act as such and it was infinitely fit that Adam should have a sacred regard to his authority in all things, because he was such-and that his eternal welfare should lie at stake, and be suspended upon his good behavior: And, no doubt, Adam viewed things thus, and was thoroughly sensible that God had a right to prohibit that tree upon pain of death, and that he was under infinite obligations to have a most sacred regard to his will in that matter.―Thus that constitution was holy,

And if we consider, in the next place, that, as has been observed, Adam was under infinite obligations to love God, his Maker, with all his heart, and obey him in every thing, resulting from the very reason and nature of things, it will appear that the threatening was just; and no more than what he must have expected, had he fallen into any sin whatsoever, antecedent to any constitution at all. Adam, in a state of pure nature, i. e. prior to any covenant-transaction, was under infinite obligations to perfect love and perfect obedience; the least defect, therefore, must have been infinitely sinful; and so, by consequence, must have deserved an infinite punishment: And it was meet that God, the Governor of the world, should punish sin according to its real desert: in the nature of things it was meet, antecedent to any express declaration of his design to do so; and Adam knew all this: He knew what obligations he was under to God, to love him with all his heart, and obey him in every thing; and, by consequence, he was conscious to himself that the least defect would be an infinite evil, and so would deserve an infinite punishment; and he knew that it was the nature of God to render to every one according to his deserts : he was certain, therefore, from the reason and nature of things, antecedent to that threatening, that the least sin would expose him to an infinite punishment. From this view of the case, it is plain, that that threatening was just, and Adam did most perfectly approve of it as such. It was no more than it was reasonable for Adam to expect, and meet for God to inflict, for any transgression of the law of nature: And it was against the law of nature for Adam to eat the forbidden fruit, when once God had said he should not. It was practically denying God's supremacy.....casting off his authority, and actually setting up his will against the Lord's. If any sin, therefore, deserved an infinite punishment, surely that did.

Remark. And here, by the way, from this view of the case, we may gain a certain knowledge of what God meant by Thou shalt surely die; or, as it is in the original, In dying thou shalt die; and may be certain how Adam understood it. He did

not mean that Adam should be annihilated; for such a punishment was not equal to the crime: He might, without injustice, have annihilated Adam, had he remained innocent; for he that gives Being, of his mere good pleasure, may, of his mere good pleasure, take it away again: nor could Adam have brought God into debt by a thousand years' perfect obedience; for he owed himself, and all he could do, to God his Maker....Rom. xi. 35. God meant to punish Adam according to his deserts; but annihilation would not have been such a punishment: and therefore it is certain that this was not what God meant. Adam knew that sin was an infinite evil, and so deserved an infinite punishment, and that it was meet it should be punished according to its deserts, and that it was the nature of God to do so; but annihilation was not such a punishment, and Adam could not but know it: and therefore Adam could not understand death in this sense. God meant to punish Adam according to his deserts. And what did he deserve? Why, an infinite punishment; i. e. to have all good taken away, and all kinds of evil come upon him forever. Well, what good had Adam in possession? Why, he had a natural life, resulting from the union of his soul and body, with all the delights and sweetnesses thereof; and he had a spiritual life, resulting from the gracious influences of the holy spirit, and consisting of the image of God, and sense of his love, with all the delights and sweetnesses thereof; and he was formed for immortality, and so was in a capacity of eternal life and blessedness, in glorifying God, and enjoying him: Here, therefore, he was capable of a natural, a spiritual, and an eternal death-to have soul and body rent asunder forever-to be forsaken by the spirit of God, and given up to the power of sin and satan forever, and to have God Almighty become his everlasting enemy. All this he deserved ; and therefore God meant all this: All this he knew he should deserve; and therefore he could not but understand the threatening to comprehend all this. Besides, that which makes it still more certain, that this was the meaning of that first threatening, is, that God has since very expressly threatened eternal LL

death as the wages of the least sin....Rom. i. 18-Gal. iii. 10~ Mat. xxv. 46; (and the word DEATH itself is plainly used to signify eternal death and misery....Rom. vi. 23-Rom. viii. 13): So that either now he means to punish sin more than it de serves, or he intended then to punish sin less than it deserved; or else eternal death was what he always meant, by threatening death as the wages of sin. If he means to punish sin now more than he did then, it is too much now, or not enough then; both which are equally contrary to the reason and nature of things, and equally inconsistent with the impartial justice of the divine nature, which always inclines him to render to every one accor ding to his deserts....nor more, nor less: and therefore eternal death was intended in that first threatening: But this by the way.

And, lastly, as that constitution was holy and just, so also it was good; because it put Adam (personally.considered) under better circumstances than he was before: For, while in a state of pure nature, perfect obedience could not have given him any title to eternal life; but, as was said before, God might have annihilated him at pleasure, after a hundred, or a thousand, or ten thousand years, without any injustice to him....(Fob xxii. 2 -Rom. xi. 35.) But now, under this constitution, he had an assurance of eternal life upon perfect obedience: For, inasmuch as God threatened death in case he should sin, it is evidently implied that he should have lived forever in case he had been obedient: So that there was infinite goodness manifested to Adam (personally considered) in this constitution-eternal life being thus promised, of mere unmerited bounty. And be sides, after a while, his state of trial would have been at an end, and he confirmed in an immutable state of holiness and happiness; of which confirmation the tree of life seems to have been designed as a sacramental sign....Gen. iii. 22-Rev. ii. 7, and xxii. 14: Whereas, had he remained in a state of pure nature, he must have been everlastingly in a state of probation, had it pleased his Maker to have continued him in being: So that, upon the whole, it is plain, this constitution, as to Adam, per

sonally considered, was holy, just, and good; and Adam had great reason, with all his heart, to give thanks to God his Maker, for his goodness and condescension, that he would be so kind, and stoop so low, as to enter into such a covenant with a worm of the dust: and, no doubt, he did so, with the sincerest gratitude. We proceed, therefore, to consider,

(2.) That if all his posterity had been put under this same constitution, one by one, from age to age, as they came into being, to act singly for themselves, it had also, as to them, have been HOLY, JUST, and GOOD: As it was better for Adam than a state of pure nature, so it would have been, for the same reason, better for us. We (had we remained in a state of pure nature, i. e. without any constitution at all) should have been, each one of us, under the same infinite obligation to perfect obedience to the law of nature, and equally exposed to the same infinite punishment for the least sin, as he was, and as much without a title to life upon perfect obedience, and as liable to be everlastingly in a state of probation: And, therefore, such a constitution would have been as great a favor to us, as it was to him; 'and we equally under obligations to gratitude and thankfulness to God therefor. But,

(3.) It was as well for our interest, in the nature of the thing, in all respects, that Adam should be made a public head and representative, to act not only for himself, but for all his posterity, as if we had been put to act singly for ourselves; and, in some respects,, better: For Adam was, in the nature of the thing, in all respects, as likely to stand as any of us should have been, and, in some respects, more likely; for he had as good natural powers—as much of the image of God, and as great a sense of his obligations, as any of us should have had; and had, in all respects, as many motives to watchfulness; and, in some respects, more -in that not only his own everlasting welfare lay at stake, but also the everlasting welfare of all his posterity too. Besides, he had just received the law from God's own mouth, and he was in a state of perfect manhood when his trial began: So that, upon the whole, in the nature of the thing, it was more likely he